McMahon kicks Knights past East in double OT

TOWAMENCIN – Under the lights and under the rain – it was a combination that worked for the North Penn boys’ soccer team in a Wednesday night double overtime thriller over CB East.  

It wasn’t the prettiest start for North Penn (3-0) in what would turn out to be a long and grueling match.  CB East (0-2-1) would put up the game’s first goal a minute and six seconds from the opening whistle. North Penn would then try and equalize the score by winning the battle in the middle of the field and going on the counter attack.  

Eventually they would be successful as senior Luke McMahon would score the equalizer (34:23) for North Penn and send the game into a 1-1 tie at halftime.

Coming out of halftime the Knights looked more aggressive than ever as they were getting the majority of shots off and dominating the time of possession, which was all apart of Coach Duddy’s plan.

“Just getting the ball in their end, our attacking third, just increases the percentages that something eventually will happen and get through, we have enough talent to do that [capitalize on scoring chances],” Duddy said.

But all this went for nothing as neither team scored in the second half and the game went into overtime.

As the rain increased, the intensity of the game did as well. The Knights attack kept up their second half tactics as their attack would keep up the pace getting many quality shots but unfortunately no goals to show for it.  So onto a second overtime period the game went.

The intensity was definitely rising for both teams before the start of the second overtime period.  On one side of the field you heard “KNIGHTS ON THREE, 1,2,3, KNIGHTS!!!,” immediately followed by “EAST ON THREE, 1,2,3, EAST!!!”.   And the mentality for the players couldn’t have been summed up any better than the words from junior Carter Houlihan who screamed to his team while walking onto the field, “Who wants it more?”

Both teams took the ball to the opposing side to get good shots but it couldn’t go on forever and it wouldn’t as McMahon had enough.  On a counter attack McMahon received a perfect pass from senior Aidan Jerome which created a clear shot to the goal for McMahon who would not disappoint.  McMahon kicked the ball into the opposite corner of the net (95:15) to win the game 2-1 for the Knights.

Even with a good chance, when the game is on the line simple things can become hard but not for McMahon.

“It was a great ball by Aidan, I just knew I had to get a shot on net, either I was gonna score one or two the keeper was gonna save it and we were gonna have a rebound because of the slick conditions so as long as I got that ball on target we would have finished a goal and came out with the win,” McMahon exlpained.

After a long, tiring match the Knights will only have one rest day as they will be back to the action for a home game Friday against Quakertown (1-3).